The faint light that remained after the sun went out hung high in the sky. That faint light could not illuminate the sea, but instead made the whole world seem even darker and more terrifying.

The White Oak sailed into the depths of this darkness.

The lights on the boat have been turned on, and the glow of the oil lamps and electric lighting spread out, illuminating a small area of ​​the sea nearby. The tiny waves rise and fall in the faint light, looking as if they have a sticky and ominous texture.

Lawrence held the rudder and responded to the voice in his mind: "…The situation on the White Oak is fine. Except for the sailors being a little nervous, there is nothing wrong with the ship. However, it has fallen into darkness around us, and we have lost contact with other ships on the route. In addition, the navigation has failed. Now all we can see in the observatory is darkness."

Duncan's voice echoed directly in his mind: "Can you contact Cold Harbor, which is closest to you? You should have just left that city-state not long ago."

"No," Lawrence looked back at the communication station not far away and saw that all the lights on the machine were red. "All communications were cut off. The priest tried to use psychic resonance to contact the cathedral in Cold Harbor, but received no response. The psychic resonance with Plande can still be maintained."

"Prande is fine, and Frost is also fine. The current situation is that except for Frost, Prande, and Breeze Harbor, all other city-states are no longer contactable. It feels like... they all disappeared after the sun went out."

Listening to Captain Duncan's description, Lawrence's expression gradually tensed up and he swallowed hard, as if he dared not continue to make any further associations.

Then he looked down at the dashboard next to the steering wheel and quickly confirmed the various parameters.

"We are sailing at full speed towards Plande. This is a very busy route. In theory, we should see a transit port soon - that is the affiliated island of the Lensa city-state. We will confirm the situation there and report to you as soon as possible..."

Lawrence said this quickly in his mind, but before he finished, a sudden sound of hurried footsteps interrupted what he wanted to say.

A crew member ran into the bridge in a panic: "Captain! Captain! Come and have a look! That 'sailor' has discovered something terrible!"

"Abnormal 077?" Lawrence's expression suddenly straightened up, and then he turned to look at the first mate beside him, "Gus, you take the helm, I'll go over and take a look!"

First mate Gus immediately stepped forward: "Yes, Captain!"

Lawrence quickly left the bridge and, under the guidance of the crew member, hurriedly walked through the stairs and corridors and came to the deck at the stern of the White Oak. As soon as he arrived here, he saw the skinny figure busy at the edge of the stern deck.

Anomaly 077, this strange living mummy was busy doing something beside a huge iron barrel, mumbling non-stop while busying itself. Lawrence walked forward and heard clearly what the mummy was mumbling: "It's over, it's over, we're done this time, no one can leave, no one can go back, the whole world is over, I might as well die in sleep..."

This guy is as full of negative energy as ever.

Lawrence didn't want to listen to Anomaly 077 continue talking, so he immediately took two steps forward and interrupted him loudly: "What are you doing?"

The mummy suddenly started to tremble, as if awakened from a dream, and quickly nodded and bowed: "Captain! Captain, you are here... Oh, good, now that the captain is here, everything will be settled..."

"That's enough," Lawrence waved his hand and asked again, "What on earth are you doing?"

"You have to look at this, you have to look at this..." the mummy said hurriedly, and then ran to the iron barrel and stirred it twice with a large pair of tongs - a sticky grease sound came from inside.

Only then did Lawrence realize that the iron barrel was full of oil, and Anomaly 077 was stirring a piece of rag in the barrel of oil with pliers. Then the mummy took out the rag that was soaked in oil, and took out a lighter that he had asked from some crew member and lit the cloth.

As Lawrence frowned, Anomaly 077 threw the burning rag into the sea with all his strength. The fireball landed on the sea and quickly drifted behind the White Oak with the waves.

Anomaly 077 babbled, "This is how sailors used to roughly estimate speed. It was done before your fancy machines were invented. It's not very accurate, but it's useful..."

"I know, I've read about it," Lawrence interrupted, "but what do you want me to see?"

The "sailor" waved his hands vigorously and pointed to the distance: "Keep looking, we're almost there, look at the fire drifting away..."

Lawrence frowned and turned to stare at the ball of fire floating on the sea - it was drifting rapidly behind the White Oak, which was natural because the White Oak was sailing forward at full speed, so there was nothing strange about this phenomenon.

Until the flame suddenly stopped in the distance.

Lawrence's eyes suddenly froze.

The ball of fire, which theoretically should have continued to drift farther and farther until it was eventually swallowed by the waves or exceeded the limit of the naked eye, stopped in the distance.

A rough estimate puts that location at only a few hundred meters away from the White Oak.

Lawrence stared at that direction, looking at the flame that was parked hundreds of meters away from the stern of the White Oak. It was as if the flame was sailing at a constant speed along with the White Oak. After a long time, the flame finally gradually weakened and went out at the edge of the dark sea.

The "sailor" picked up a piece of rag with tongs, soaked it with grease, lit it and threw it into the water.

The second fireball entered the water, drifted backwards quickly, and then stopped at the same distance.

Anomaly 077 finally threw away the pliers in his hand. He turned to look at Lawrence, and a sad expression seemed to appear on his skinny and scary face: "Captain, how do you think... how can we use science to explain this matter?"

This time, Lawrence did not start to tease this "abnormal" person for being so persistent in explaining things with science as he did in the past. He just stood quietly on the edge of the deck. After an unknown amount of time, he said as if talking to himself, "Did you see that?"

Abnormal 077 next to him was stunned when he heard this: "Ah? Who are you talking to?"

Lawrence did not answer. Instead, Duncan's deep and majestic voice came from his mind: "I saw it. I saw it very clearly by sharing your vision."

"What... do you think of this phenomenon?" Lawrence asked cautiously.

"The laws of physics are becoming unfamiliar. It is most likely due to the 'chaos' in space, or it could be due to a deeper reason. In short, after the sun went out, the Infinite Ocean is changing rapidly - but the White Oak and the small area around it are still normal."

Lawrence thought for a moment and spoke hesitantly: "This is your power at work..."

"Maybe, but I need some time to figure out the reasons behind this."

Listening to the voice in his mind and looking at the dark and chaotic sea in the distance, Lawrence fell into deep thought.

However, at this moment, a strange low sound that seemed to come from the sky and echoed throughout the world suddenly interrupted his thoughts.

It was a strange, slow humming sound, like a giant beast gasping for breath, or some unimaginably large device slowly starting up. It sounded faint and distant, yet it seemed to fill the entire world and echo in everyone's ears.

Lawrence looked up in astonishment and looked at the extinguished sun.

The double rune rings around the sun were flickering in and out, and along with the flickering of the rune rings, the dark sphere at the center of Vision 001 gradually began to reveal wisps of glow.

The strands of light were faintly red at first, like bloodshot, but then they began to spread throughout the sphere and quickly became brighter...

※※※

A huge luminous geometric object floated on the sea, and the "sunlight" it released evenly illuminated the Breeze Harbor not far away, as well as the Brilliant Star docked near the floating dock.

On the highest scientific research platform of the Brilliant Star, Lucrecia was staring at the large round crystal lens in front of her.

A faint blue light floated around the crystal lens, while the center of the lens showed a group of undulating, light and dark colors.

The clockwork puppet "Luni" stood near Lucrecia, using her precise and deft hands to adjust the dazzling observation equipment while reporting to her mistress: "From just now, the 'sunlight' released by the luminous geometric bodies has added these strange 'signals'. They are invisible to the naked eye, but can be captured by the observation lenses on the ship, presenting this kind of light and dark and constantly undulating ripples..."

Lucrecia raised her head and looked toward the front of the room. This scientific research platform was closed, but there was a special window at the end of the room. The "sunlight" from the luminous geometric body was introduced into the room through the window, and then processed by a series of complex lens devices. It was finally split into a spectrum and projected onto a specific observation device. This entire set of equipment was designed and built by her personally.

This is a large-scale installation she built specifically to study the "luminous geometry" - and now it is working.

Lucrecia withdrew her gaze and looked at the recording device on the table next to her that was constantly spitting out paper tapes - the long paper tape recorded the spectral changes captured by the lens system, and the jumping black lines showed a clear and definite periodicity.

"These 'light signals' follow a pattern..." she said softly.

"Yes," the puppet Luni nodded, "Each signal transmission cycle is twelve seconds, repeated three times, and then there is a thirty-second interval before it appears again."

"Was it sent from that 'stone ball'?"

"It's impossible to be sure - there are people from the Academy of Truth monitoring the stone ball, but they didn't find any changes in the ball itself. These 'light signals' are more like they are generated directly from the luminous area around the ball..."

The doll Luni paused in the middle of her speech.

"Mistress, the light signal has stopped."

Lucrecia looked at the crystal lens in front of her in astonishment.

The undulating waves of light and dark colors have disappeared.

She was stunned for a moment, and then seemed to suddenly think of something. Her figure suddenly disintegrated, turning into flying colorful pieces of paper that swirled out of the window.

Colorful pieces of paper fluttered above the deck and quickly re-formed. Lucrecia stood on the upper deck of the Brilliant Star, squinting her eyes and looking up at the sky.

Through the pale golden "sunlight" that permeated the sea, she saw an exceptionally bright light hanging high in the sky.

The sun shone again.